Monthly Archives: May 2015

Download the Gear set lists yourself

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gandlaf staff 1So I have been thinking. In the previous update, I stated the top30 images of best sets would follow tomorrow. Not so. Instead, if you follow the link given below, you can download a RAR file containing the 2 spreadsheets with processed gear combinations, one offensive and one defensive.

Now you can look at the full lists yourself, play around, adjust the numbers for your specific random rolls, whatever, it is up to you. I just hope somebody has some use for it…The link will also be added to the Best Sets article.

Link for the spreadsheets

Best Sets updated

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bilbo cloakFinally the Best Sets article has the level 2 Legendaries added to it. As I predicted, the best sets are pretty much identical to those before, just with the level 1’s swapped for levels 2. Remember this for when higher levels are announced and the article isn’t updated immediately (assuming the trend from 1 to 2 continues in 3). The top 30 images will be added tomorrow.

Hero Skills updated

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skill farming II have just released an updated version of the Hero Skills article. Although it was put out pretty soon after Hero Skills were released, no major updates have followed, leaving much of the diagrams on Skill overview and Upgrade costs empty. Took a while for me to realize this, so there you go. Only a few numbers are still missing, if you happen to know them, please leave a comment.

Next up is the Best Sets article. I am putting the new gear ** in my spreadsheets and will probably update the article tonight when I have time. Stay tuned and happy Hobbiting!

Best Sets and Legendary level **

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tauriel bowI know one of the articles desperate in need for an update (again) is the Best Sets article. Although containing all level 1 Legendary gear, the level 2 upgrades haven’t been included yet. Now I have two things to say…or three basically, if you count “I’m gonna do them don’t worry“.

First, because ALL the new gear is basically just the level 1 Legendary gear slightly improved (not even basically actually, just fact), I still believe the Best Sets article at the moment is still relevant enough to use, at least as a starting point. I honestly do not expect any major changes when adding in the level 2’s.

That said, I am gonna update them, but as I have been away for some time, I’m not 100% sure which level 2’s have already been introduced. So what I am asking here is to describe in the comments what pieces have been released, and there base stats and specific Hero bonus. The four bonus attributes are already covered in the Hero equipment article, so I don;t need that, unless you find errors in them of course.

Thanks for being patient and see you soon with an updated article.

Battle Mechanics V: Conclusion

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headerWelcome once more to the final part in this series for now. Warning up front: This article will not contain (much) new information, but will serve, as the title implies, as a conclusion on the previous parts I-IV, summarizing the findings, and perhaps serving as an easy reference piece. So let’s go over what we covered in the previous parts.

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Battle Mechanics IV: Diminishing Returns and how to deal with it

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attackWelcome to the fourth installment in this Battle Mechanics series. In this part, we will once again take a closer look at Diminishing Returns, how it works, and how it influences our choices for gear and Gems, following the formulas we arrived at in parts I, II and III. Diminishing Returns (henceforth DR) can be a tricky subject, but once you understand how it works it is actually pretty easy to work with.

  • 1. The concept behind DR
  • 2. DR visualized
  • 3. DR and distribution of buffs and debuffs
  • 4. Should you always balance buff and debuff?
  • 5. Conclusion on choosing gear with DR in mind

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Battle Mechanics III: Why your opponent doesn’t matter

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skill fierce loyaltyWelcome to part III in this Battle Mechanics series. In part I and II, we constructed the basic battle formula with buffs and debuffs, focusing specifically on gear buff and debuffs. Now it is time to chose the optimal set of gear. But before we get to that, we consider here our opponent. Many people still tell me that I have to take into account the opponent’s gear when choosing my own, in the sense that (usually), if an opponent has mostly debuffs, I should aim for buffs, and vice versa.

In part IV, we are going to (for the last time hopefully) discuss our own gear choices, taking Diminishing Returns into account, but here in part III, I will first briefly detail why you should never look at your opponent’s buffs and debuffs distribution.

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Absence and update on Tokens and more..

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inactveSo it really has been a while since I have been active. I already explained some of the reasons in earlier posts, but right now I have been of the game and site for some weeks almost completely. Personal life took a front seat and already narrowed the available time to play the game, but also the game itself hasn’t been as fun to me as it used to.

In essence, with all the new features and additions and content being dropped in a small time frame over the past months, this game for me at least, needs too much time spent per day for players to be competitive. For me, even with this site, this still remained a mobile game to me, which I play(ed) on my phone for some time a day, but definitely not hours on end (I know many of you do though).

On of my older articles detailed a set of 10 daily things to do in the game, but such a list today, with all the new features would require a lot of time if you want to stay ahead of the game and competition. Acquire gear, farm Tokens, Hero Skills, Mining, endless batches of tournaments…I can’t just pick up the game for an hour a day and expect to be competitive in any sense, and I find that frustrating. Sure there were always times, like during tournaments, when more time and effort was required, or if you wanted to farm a lot of Smaug tokens, but there were also stretches of time when less time was needed.

And that is no more. Putting Tokens in mines might be a solution to the auto-bots, and in theory even spice things up a bit, but in an active server, mining can be frustrating and requiring attention for quite some time. I want to play this game on the side, not spend hours a day just to keep up.

But there are more things that are bothering me. Especially the pay-to-win model Kabam enforces is failing to keep me interested. I started out not spending a dime on the game, and for a year, that wasn’t necessary. Once I became a member of a top Alliance, I did spend some, and it felt good, but that feeling didn’t last. Spending, in my humble opinion, should of course give spenders an advantage, but not make them better or nearly unbeatable in every aspect of the game. Spending to get your hands on the first level 8 Artamir gems and Legendary gear made you invincible basically. Right now things are evening out again as most players acquire these items themselves, but the process will repeat.

Ugh, this probably sounds whiney to most, but I just want to explain my absence a bit. Given this site it should be clear I loved this game, but it slowly fading, which is really sad, because especially the team members/alliance play is what makes this game great.

So that said, I will slowly resume putting out articles and updating older ones, such as on the Hero Skills. I will try to keep up to date with new features, and hope I can find both the time and motivation to really start playing again….